Introverted Dance Music
I'm criminally behind on music lately. I have a list of music from 2020 I'm still slowly making my way through. Like most people, I feel like my life "paused" around that time and I'm still playing catch up.
When I was younger I used to take music very seriously and would devote hours to downloading music, organizing my music library, seeding things on Oink (sigh, RIP). Most of the music on my external is stuff from that era. My husband doesn't really listen to music much. He's been slowly making his way through one of my old flash drives while annoyingly critiquing everything.
The only thing he really likes so far is Cocteau Twins, but he hated Treasure (one of my favorite albums) and preferred Garlands. I told him, "Heaven or Las Vegas is their most popular album. No one cares about Garlands." He replied, "Yeah, but it's too soft."
That's been his complaint about everything. "Everything's too ambient. Too ethereal." He said this while skipping past Andy Stott, Bjork, Cibo Matto, DNTL, Emeralds, Fever Ray, Goldfrapp, Hooverphonic, Joanna Newsom, Kahimi Karie...
While listening to Jega's Geometry he started complaining about how boring it sounded and, feeling a little defensive, I told him, "You know, back in the early 2000s this was called IDM music and everyone was really into it back then."
Him: IDM? What does that stand for?
Me: The name isn't what's important. It's kind of stupid.
Him: Yeah, but what does it stand for?
Me: It stands for Intelligent Dance Music. Which, I know sounds a little pretentious, which is why I always hated the name.
Him: So regular dance music is called what? Stupid Dance Music?
Me: No, of course not, that's why I always hated the name. It's not about intellect. I think people just wanted to make sure there was a clear distinction between IDM and typical '90s techno. IDM is electronic music, but it's not dance-able. You're supposed to listen to it alone on your headphones while daydreaming or whatever. EDM came after that. I guess people got tired of daydreaming.
Him: Shouldn't they have called it Introverted Dance Music instead?
Me: (thinking) Hey, you're right. 🤯
Him: They're stupid for not even thinking of that.
As time goes on, it's interesting watching people attempt to rewrite history, so maybe this is one I can rewrite. If anyone asks, IDM stands for Introverted Dance Music and EDM is Extroverted Dance Music — as it should've been called from the beginning.